Press digest – Ukraine

Third month of heroic resistance of Ukraine against Russian military invasion

Key updates on the war against Ukraine as of May 2, 2022

#ArmUkraineNow

#SaveMariupol

DESTRUCTION AND LOSSES

📌On Sunday, May 1, with the support of the United Nations and the Red Cross, the evacuation of civilians from Azovstal began. “The first group of about 100 people is already heading to the controlled area. Tomorrow we will meet with them in Zaporizhzhia. Thank you to our team! Currently, they, together with UN representatives, are working on the evacuation of other civilians from the plant,” said Volodymyr Zelensky, President of Ukraine.

Once the evacuation from Azovstal was over, the Russians started shelling Mariupol again, said Denys Shlega, commander of the 12th National Guard’s operational brigade, who is currently in the city. Prior to that, the parties had been observing a ceasefire.

About 20 more children remain at Azovstal, the commander added.

📌As of May 2, 219 children died as a result of the armed aggression of the Russian Federation in Ukraine. The number of injured is over 405.

📌On April 29, due to artillery shelling by the occupiers of the village, a 15-year-old boy was injured in the Velykonovosilkivskyi district of the Donetsk region.

📌15 1570 educational institutions were damaged due to daily bombings and shelling by the Russian armed forces. At the same time, 111 of them were completely destroyed.

📌Mass burial of citizens killed by the occupiers was found in the Bucha district, Kyiv region. The victims were tortured and shot. This was reported by the Kyiv Region Police. In total, investigators examined 1,202 bodies of civilians killed by the Russian occupiers in the Kyiv region.

“The victims were tortured for a long period of time, bullet wounds were found on their limbs. Finally, each of the men was shot in the ear. This is another mass grave made by the occupiers in the Bucha district, the long-suffering district, where more than a thousand citizens have been killed and tortured,” – Kyiv Region Police Chief Andriy Nebytov said.

📌In the occupied territories, Russian soldiers are destroying medical infrastructure, stealing equipment, closing facilities and banning the delivery of medicines from Ukrainian-controlled territories. All equipment, including ventilators needed for critical cases of COVID-19 disease, was removed from the Starobilsk Infectious Diseases Department (Luhansk Oblast). At the regional anti-tuberculosis dispensary in Vovchanska (Kharkiv region), patients with an open form of tuberculosis were denied medical care and expelled to the streets. Premises used to treat infectious diseases are being filled by wounded Russians.

📌Russian troops continue shelling the eastern and southern regions of Ukraine:

Dnipropetrovsk region – 1 injured,

Kharkiv region – 7 people died, 10 injured;

Chernihiv region – shelling of the checkpoint,

Donetsk region – 4 dead, 18 people injured, out of whom there are 3 children,

Mykolayiv region – 5 people were injured, targeted in a mineral fertilizer storage facility, cluster munitions from the Uragan (Hurricane) MLRS exploded in the yards of civilians, private houses and yards were damaged.
Luhansk region – 2 schools and 20 houses were destroyed, 16 massive artillery attacks.

📌In addition, on April 30, Russian troops launched a missile strike on the Odesa region. As a result, the runway of Odesa airport was damaged and can no longer be used. Bastion missile launchers struck from the Crimea. There are no casualties.

📌On May 1, in Nova Kakhovka, Kherson Region, Ihor Protokovylo, a deputy of the local city council, was abducted. His whereabouts are currently unknown. Also in the Kherson region and a part of the Zaporizhzhia region, communication and the Internet were cut off. At the same time, the Russians are spreading fakes that the disconnection took place allegedly on the instructions of the Ukrainian authorities.

📌In Enerhodar, the occupiers began to put Russian rubles into circulation.

📌As of April 30, more than 250 cultural institutions were destroyed and damaged in Ukraine due to the war.

📌On the night of April 30, an An-30 reconnaissance aircraft of the Russian Air Force flew into Swedish airspace. This is stated in the message of the Swedish Armed Forces.

📌Almost 4.5 million tons of grain are blocked in Ukrainian ports due to the war. This was informed by the representative of the UN World Food Program Martin Frick.

MARIUPOL NEWS

📌According to Reuters, more than 50 civilians were deported from Mariupol on May 1. They arrived at a temporary center for displaced persons in the village of Bezimenne in the Donetsk region, which is under occupation. Subsequently, there was information about the arrival of another group of 14 people.

According to a Reuters correspondent, they all left the area adjacent to the Azovstal plant. People were transported on buses with Ukrainian license plates, accompanied by a convoy of Russian soldiers and cars with UN symbols.

📌On May 1, the Russian military began expropriating the homes of Mariupol residents who had left the occupied territories. Unknown people are living in their houses. The spokesman of the Odesa military administration Sergey Bratchuk reported about it.

📌On April 30, a tank with the symbols of the Russian army shot a residential building point-blank. 16 civilians were hiding in the basement of the building from a shell.

SITUATION IN TRANSNISTRIA

⚠️A large circulation of the newspaper, dated May 2, 2022, was published in Transnistria, in which residents allegedly appealed to the President of the Russian Federation to “involve the armed forces of the Transnistrian region in the actions of the Russian army.” The newspaper contains a number of articles about “bloody terrorist attacks on Transnistrians on the May holidays, dozens killed, including children, the elderly and women.”

⚠️After provocations on the territory of unrecognized Transnistria, people are moving towards Moldova. Some of them are going to the Odesa region, – the spokesman of the Odesa military administration reported.

RUSSIAN CONTEXT

⚠️Russia is trying to circumvent sanctions by involving post-Soviet countries, including Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan. Thus, they plan to establish the supply of components for the production of military goods.

⚠️The Main Department of Intelligence of the Ministry of Defense reported that as of April 30, the Russians had almost exhausted the resources for forced mobilization in the ORDLO (The uncontrolled portions of the Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts). In order to implement the set plans for the supply of “manpower”, they suspended medical examinations of mobilized personnel. Official explanation: “due to lack of specialists”. At present, potential “recruits” are unable to obtain documents proving any health problems.

Those who have obvious health problems (injuries, disabilities, severe acute illnesses) or have managed to get the necessary documents, are still mobilized, but they are distributed to the logistics departments.
Russian military police conduct regular raids on the streets and at the probable residence of “conscripts”.
The only alternative to forced mobilization is to pay a bribe at fixed rates (depending on age, specialty and health). In particular, in occupied Horlivka the size of a bribe for the purpose of evasion from service makes 5 thousand Russians rubles minimum, if paid directly at the place of detention. When sent to the district departments of the “Ministry of Internal Affairs” – 75 thousand Russians rubles minimum.

⚠️Russian media reported the shelling of the village in the Bryansk region of the Russian Federation which borders Ukraine. They are trying to blame Ukraine.

⚠️In the temporarily occupied Kakhovka, the “government” appointed by Russia plans to celebrate May 9. “Head of the city” Pavlo Filipchuk announces “a parade, a rally, porridge, the introduction of an immortal regiment.”

DEFENSE UPDATES

📌The Armed Forces of Ukraine are renouncing Soviet weapons and are planning a gradual transition to NATO weapons.

📌On April 30, another exchange of prisoners took place. 14 people returned home: 7 military and 7 civilians. One of the military women is five months pregnant.

📌Estimated losses of the Russian Federation Army in Ukraine:

📌On May 1, a Russian reconnaissance drone was shot down by the Armed Forces of Ukraine over Odesa.

📌Soldiers of the Sarmat Battalion repulsed the enemy’s offensive in the Donetsk direction.

📌Ukrainian defenders attacked the occupiers’ positions on the captured Zmiiiny Island. Three anti-aircraft guns, the Strela-10 anti-aircraft missile system and a communications vehicle, and 42 military units were destroyed – OK Pivden.

📌In the Kherson region, the Russian electronic warfare station “Repellent-1” was destroyed by artillery fire of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

📌On April 30, Ukrenergo fully restored the sustainable energy supply of the Chornobyl NPP and the Chornobyl Exclusion Zone. The last necessary 330 kV power transmission line is now connected.

HUMANITARIAN CORRIDORS AND EVACUATION UPDATES

📌As of the morning of May 2, two additional locations have been agreed for people to be placed in the evacuation column that will leave Mariupol – Mangush village and the Lunacharsky ring near Berdyansk. The evacuation is supported by the United Nations and the Red Cross.

📌Also with the support of the UN and the Red Cross a “green corridor” Mariupol-Zaporizhzhia has been agreed. The columns of buses will go via Tokmak and Vasylivka. Information from the Zaporizhzhia Regional Military Administration.

📌 On May 1, 26 people were evacuated from Lysychansk, said Serhiy Haidai, head of the Luhansk Regional State Administration.

📌 On April 30, the Russian side thwarted an evacuation in Popasna: diversionists fired at vehicles with grenade launchers. One bus was found empty and with traces of blood, the other one could not be found. This was reported by the head of the Luhansk Regional State Administration Serhiy Haidai.

PUBLIC AND BUSINESS SUPPORT

📌 The Hollywood actress and UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador, Angelina Jolie, came to Lviv. Together with colleagues from the UN who deal with refugees, Angelina is engaged in organizing assistance to Ukrainians.

📌On April 30, a rally for Ukraine took place in Budapest, which garnered more support, also from Hungarians, than any of the previous pro-Ukrainian rallies – more than 800 participants.

📌A rally in support of Ukraine took place in Toronto. It was organized by students and joined by Mayor John Tory, who supports the Ukrainian diaspora. Rallies were also held in Santa Monica, Berlin and Paris. In Lisbon, on Portugal’s main square, a heart-shaped canvas of two flags was unfurled.

📌The park near the Russian Embassy in Stockholm will be given the name “Place of Free Ukraine”. It will be a symbol of Stockholm’s solidarity with the Ukrainian people.

📌The Italian Cesvi Foundation will provide € 500,000 for the restoration of Bucha. This is a preliminary amount to which other donations by private and public donors will be added. The municipality of the Italian city of Bergamo will become Bucha’s partner.

INTERNATIONAL SUPPORT OF UKRAINE

📌Friedrich Merz, leader of Germany’s largest opposition Christian Democratic Union, will visit Ukraine on May 2.

📌At the meeting of leaders of EU member states in June, Ukraine will be granted the status of a candidate for EU membership – Olha Stefanishyna. Part of the documents (questionnaire) submitted by Ukraine have already been processed in Brussels and the work of the state authorities has been evaluated highly.

📌Denmark is to send 25 Piranha III wheeled armored personnel carriers, M10 heavy mortars and shells to Ukraine. The Armed Forces will also receive 50 units of other armored personnel carriers – M113. The United States is to send this model to Ukraine.

📌Next week, the European Union will announce the sixth package of sanctions against Russia and plans to cut Sberbank off the SWIFT system, while the proposed oil embargo will be fully operational by the end of the year.

📌Germany will not pay for Russian gas in rubles, — Finance Minister Christian Lindner assured.

📌 Poland and Lithuania are helping Ukraine restore the system of TV and radio transmitters destroyed by rocket fire from the invaders. The Republic of Lithuania has already provided 19 television and FM transmitters for such purposes.

📌 Slovenia will provide almost € 180,000 in financial assistance to Ukraine: 100 IP phones, 40 desktops, 40 laptops, petrol generators, antennas and cables.

📌 Warsaw became the first capital of the potential guarantor states to publicly declare that it would not participate in such a peace agreement, which would provide for the surrender of part of the territory of Ukraine.

📌 The Embassy of the Republic of Azerbaijan resumed its work in Kyiv. From April 30, the Consular Department will be open daily.

📌Denmark and Sweden summon the ambassadors of the Russian Federation for violating their airspace by a Russian reconnaissance aircraft.